


Feel You In My Blood

by fishfingersandjellybabies



Category: Batman (Comics)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-16
Updated: 2016-03-16
Packaged: 2018-05-27 01:19:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,266
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6263854
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fishfingersandjellybabies/pseuds/fishfingersandjellybabies
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Damian had made it his mission. His whole reason for living. To gather Dick’s pieces, to fight off a world who sought him harm, to glue him back together and keep him whole.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Feel You In My Blood

**Author's Note:**

> Here’s a vague meta about how I 100% believe Damian canonly ‘saved’ Dick way more than/potentially equal to how Dick saved Damian, but in fanfiction form! Supplemental listening/based on ‘Fire & the Flood’ by Vance Joy. The situation at the end is to be around Robin War, when they all meet and eat and talk about training the Robin kids. I imagine they like, stayed the night at that apartment or safehouse or whatever before jumping into action.

He was always there.

In every moment Dick needed him. In every bad time and good. Through every mask and every attempt at fakery. Through every truth, but especially, through every lie.

He was there when Bruce was dead. When Dick wasn’t really _Dick_. Too caught up in his grief, too caught up in…just being _lost_. In losing his father for the second time in his life, and not knowing how to handle it.

He was there when Dick tried to be Batman. _Bruce’s_ Batman, not his own. He was there when it worked, and especially when it didn’t. He was there when no one trusted him, when no one believed in him.

When he didn’t believe in _himself_.

He was there through the fights, and the arguments. He was there through the fiasco with Tim. He was there, he _stayed_ , when Dick gave up. On this, on Batman, on himself. On _him_.

He was there when Dick doubted himself. When he questioned what he was doing, questioned what he was _not_ doing. He was there when the sadness got too much. When the anger did too.

When he had no one else.

 _No one_ else.

He was there when he went back to Nightwing, and that was when Dick started to notice. Because he shouldn’t have been. Because Dick broke his heart, because Dick knew that the second he walked out the door. When he never called, never wrote, never visited. When Dick told himself every lie under the sun.

_This is what he wanted, this is what’s best for him. I can’t get in the way of this._

He stayed, and he shouldn’t have.

He was there when Dick lost the circus. When Dick lost his friends. When the Joker got to them all. He was there when everyone else ignored him, and his symptoms. His problems. He was there, when Dick put on the smile. The one that everyone bought, even the rest of the family. The one that was faker than Bruce’s own mask to the general public.

He was there through it all. Called Dick out, soothed his heart, bandaged the wounds.

He was there, when Dick started to take him for granted.

Which was a lie – because, really, Dick started taking him for granted the day he met him. The day he took him in, the day they partnered up.

Because he was always there. When Dick needed him, when Dick didn’t. When Dick didn’t _know_ he did.

He was always there.

Always.

And then. He wasn’t.

Then, he was dead, because he’d protected him. He was dead, because he wasn’t _supposed_ to be there, and he still _was_. He was dead, because he died _protecting Dick_.

So he wasn’t there, in the aftermath. He wasn’t there when Bruce shut down, when the family was torn apart. He wasn’t there when Dick moved to Chicago, when Dick was captured by criminals from another universe.

He wasn’t there when Dick was exposed to the world.

He wasn’t there when Dick died, too.

And over Bruce’s shouting and Lex’s assurances, all Dick could think was, _this will save millions of people. This is for the good of the planet._

 _This means I’ll see_ him _again._

But he didn’t. Because he _wasn’t there_. Nothing was. When Dick died, for those few seconds, he only saw darkness.

When Dick came back, he pretended he was happy about it. Pretended he didn’t want to stay in the afterlife and tear that world apart looking for him.

He wasn’t there when Dick got shipped off to Spyral. When he pretended to be James Bond and be okay with that.  When he was ripped from his family, and willingly allowed them to believe he was still dead.

He wasn’t there, and Dick was drowning without him. He wasn’t too proud to admit that.

He just wished he wasn’t too late to say it.

Because he wasn’t there. Not physically, there was no body. Not spiritually, there were no ghosts.

He wasn’t there.

And suddenly, he _was_.

Suddenly, he was there, standing in front of Dick like he’d never left. Suddenly he was there, _smiling_. Suddenly, he was there, running at Dick like a runaway train.

Suddenly, he was there, _in Dick’s arms_. Suddenly, Dick believed himself incapable of ever letting go. _Ever_.

Suddenly, Dick wanted to do nothing but sob.

Suddenly, he was no longer drowning. Suddenly, even with all the terrible things going on with Bruce and Gotham and spies, everything was fine. Perfect. _Great_.

Because he was there.

Because he was alive.

Because he existed at _all_.

And even now. With Gotham in ruins, the Robin Movement running amok, and whispers of the Talons about to rise up once more, things were good. Things were _wonderful_.

He glanced down at the bed. The tiny bed in this tiny safehouse, the one that wasn’t meant to hold four people, let alone three grown men and a child. Tim and Jason were slumped against each other along the bottom of the mattress, Jason snoring and Tim drooling, in their exhaustion.

Dick himself was propped up against the wall behind the pillows, watching over them, like he was supposed to. Like he was _always_ supposed to.

But really. Honestly, truly. He didn’t know if he could have. Didn’t know if he’d have been physically capable of protecting his brothers, if not for the one tucked into his side.

The one brother still protecting _him_.

Dick glanced down at the tiny face pressed against his chest, the thin arm flopped across his torso. He hadn’t started out there, had started out curled into a ball as far away from the others as the mattress would allow, but had shifted in his sleep until he’d bumped into Dick’s side, and subconsciously made the best of it.

Dick smiled as held onto the little boy’s shoulder. Squeezed in once, and then gently ran his fingers through his hair, over and over. Pausing his hand only once, to kiss the child’s crown, and whisper:

“I love you so much, kiddo.”

The kiddo in question instantly stirred. Sniffed and pressed his face deeper into Dick’s shirt before attempting to sit up slightly. His sea green eyes shown in the darkness of Gotham’s nightlights, sleepy and disheveled.

“…What’d you say, Grayson?”

Dick laughed. Reached up and smoothed his hand over the boy’s sleep-wild hair.

“Nothing, Damian. Go back to sleep.”

He stared at him for a moment, blinked once, slowly, and immediately dropped back into Dick’s side. Nuzzled at him, and clung to him like he was an oversized teddy bear.

Dick kept his arm firm around his youngest brother’s back, stroking softly at his shoulder, until he heard his breaths even back out, and mingle with Jason and Tim’s.

And as he lay there, surrounded by his brothers, by those he loved most. As he held the boy to his side, and committed the scene to memory – refusing to take their time, to take _this boy_ , for granted _ever_ again – he realized:

Always. Damian had always been there. To protect him. To _love_ him. To keep him safe and happy and _stable_. For years, for _ages_ , the child had done nothing but. Despite his own problems, despite Dick’s ignorance, despite the universe doing everything it could to keep them apart.

Damian had made it his mission. His whole reason for living. To gather Dick’s pieces, to fight off a world who sought him harm, to glue him back together and keep him whole.

And it was about time Dick returned the favor.


End file.
